broken strings
by withoutaim
Summary: “There is but a fifty percent of him gone from the present, and it’s standing ghostly pale and hollow cheeked and worn out some yards away.”; altmal


title; broken strings  
rating; r  
fandom; assassin's creed

summary; _There is but a fifty percent of him gone from the present, and it's standing ghostly pale and hollow cheeked and worn out some yards away._

uh, random inspiration by song at three oh three in the morning? It's short as fuck, but honestly I don't care, it's nothing big anyway, it's an alternate take on at how it may have looked upon Altaïr's arrival home to Masyaf after the fight with Robért. Not entirely following canon after that, that is. Oh, and lack of imagination for the title, anyone?

* * *

"Look at me now, I made it  
Feel my heart now, I made it…"  
–dead by april; i made it

* * *

He's back.

Staggering and with lungs that seems to constrict with the want to burst from all the foul oxygen and stale smoke coloring the air and bloodied knuckles and probably a few broken digits twitching with the need to clutch his side. Malik knows instantly that there's a shallow wound there that needs fixing up, somebody has to do it before he loses too much blood. He can see the scene in front of him: the main artery pulsing and beating wildly and drunkenly with blood and cells and life, out of Altaïr. How there is a collective funeral amongst all those who has known him during his life in their small society. Can see ashen white and bleached bone white faces, tan with pale from the Syrian Desert sun and perhaps there'll be tears too. Tear streaked cheeks, rivulets of salt and air and water and _sorrow_.

And suddenly, there in the nonexistent chill, there is a shudder shaking him. It courses through his flesh, tears at his tendons, rattles his bones and severs his muscles, splits his cells in half. There is but a fifty percent of him gone from the present, and it's standing ghostly pale and hollow cheeked and worn out some yards away.

Malik panics, for the first time in a very, very long time, and start running.

Altaïr's swimming in front of him but that's ridiculous since he can't swim for his life, and he's distant and present, he's drifting and coming closer, and Malik gets angry. His mood shifts like somebody just made a straight fucking U-turn at a dead end, his thoughts hitting a firm cul-de-sac in his head, and he lounges at the white robed assassin.

They tumble to the ground, Altaïr now helplessly falling back under Malik's firm-but-frail weight, bird bones and five o'clock shadow of anxiety and purple bruised eyes from lack of sleep. He smells like copper and the tang of forest and reek of death, his shoulders are of lead and his legs and knees are numbed out when he lets them buckle; give away for his weight.

"You idiot. You mad, bloody idiot Altaïr. How could you almost get yourself killed? It's against the code, against our creed, no, strike that; it's against all the fucking codes and creeds in the world!" He leans his head against Altaïr's chest, taking in just how deep and short breaths he's able to inhale and release, over and over again. Relishes in it and tries to get rational and real and stop acting like this. But he can't, can't now, he's so impossibly close to losing Altaïr and he doesn't want to listen to some _rational_, fucking thought.

So he punches him, straight in the solar plexus.

He chokes, chokes on his own saliva and the foul air and on humanity and on his own throat and on Malik's presence and emotions that curls around him like plural serpents. So Malik punches again, and again, and again, this time aiming higher, more to the left. He punches until he can feel something give in and just, **pop**, underneath his sharp and thin knuckles, how Altaïr howls and shoves him off and kicks his legs and throws his head back.

But Malik's as much of a wounded animal in that minute, so he lounges forward again. He's baring his teeth and desperation rims his eyes and so he wounds his legs around Altaïr's midsection and splays his fingers all over his throat to search for the main artery in his neck. He wants to feel it, _has_ to feel it.

And when he finds it, it's not enough. The desperation starts to wear off the more the frantic birds underneath Altaïr's European milk skin flap their wings, but it's still there; lurking in the back of his head; he _has_ to feel more. So he slips his hand underneath layers of matted with dirt and blood clothing, searches. His fingers skim chest muscles tensing, goose bumps breaking out over the skin, a hardening nipple, and finally, _finally_, settle over his heart.

It's reassuring and soothing and strokes his nerves just like that, to calm him down.

Altaïr doesn't even try removing him from his chest, but he doesn't return anything. He tries to listen and hear how their hearts beat in sync but unfortunately he can't hear anything over the pain in his ribcage, the dull ache and the sharp knife twisting in his bones. He feels so old, and weary, and dirtied.

"You broke a rib, Mal."

Malik doesn't look up; he simply drops his head to Altaïr's chest, his cheek against the back of his hand underneath his robes.

"No, I didn't. You did, it's you who's broken and beaten here, Altaïr." It's a dry whisper, a twig breaking underneath a boot.

"You know what I mean." He sighs. Malik might, or might not, have looked at him then.

"Never leave." From some miracle, he's got the strength to reach up and tread through a pair of fingers in Malik's sweaty and curly hair, and so they lay.


End file.
